


A Silent Goodbye

by BecauseFanfictionThough



Category: Gotham (TV)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Gotham, angsty angst angst angst, gotham fanfiction, jerome valeska - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-12
Updated: 2016-04-12
Packaged: 2018-06-01 21:25:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 570
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6536857
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BecauseFanfictionThough/pseuds/BecauseFanfictionThough
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The bus tickets feel like they're burning a hole in your purse. It kills knowing what you have to do, but Jerome is like a wild animal and you know it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Silent Goodbye

The tickets were in your purse when you walked through the front door. You could feel them there, burning a hole through the leather. Jerome was home, just like you had expected him to be, sitting on the couch in the living room and staring through the window behind it. The sky was gray, as usual. It looked like it could start raining at any second. 

He didn’t even look up when you walked through the door. His face was blank. It had been for weeks. Ever since he’d pushed that old woman in front of a car while running from the cops. He’d stopped to watch her get hit and almost been caught by the police, so he’d decide to stay inside and lay low for a while. It was like he was a wild animal that had been caged: for the first two weeks he hadn’t say still, working on different projects and robbery plots. But after a while he simply gave in and started to sit by that window, staring outside and wondering when he’d be free again.

You hated to see him like this. It scared you more than when he was manic. He was dangerous, you knew that. But you loved him anyway.

Your mind moved back to your purse. To the bus tickets. To the goodbye.

You moved across the room, sitting beside him on the couch. Your hand reached out to touch his shoulder and he winced away. He really was like an animal. Scared to be touched and you weren’t sure if it was going to make him hide or attack. But he was an animal you knew, and even if you couldn’t be certain, you were fairly sure he wouldn’t hurt you. At least, you’d always hoped he never would.

“We need to talk,” you said. He wouldn’t look at you and you turned away, staring at your hands in your lap.

He said nothing. He just kept staring at the window. Just kept watching the skyline.

You reached into your purse and pulled out the tickets, setting them down on the empty space between you two. The space right in front of the window where the sun would have shown down if there weren’t so many gray clouds in the sky. The space where his hand used to grip yours while the two of you watched the crime dramas he loved so much.

The couch shifted as he picked them up and sat forwards, reading the words printed on them: New York City. Two transfers. First bus leaving at six-thirty. Forty seven minutes from that exact moment the two of you were sitting in together.

“Bus tickets,” he said, still putting the pieces together in his head.

“I think you’ll like it there. You won’t be trapped anymore. I already packed you a bag this morning, it’s in the coat closet. Just call me when you get there, okay?”

He didn’t say anything. He stood from the couch and crossed the room to the coat closet beside the apartment’s front door. He found the black duffel bag you’d put there before you left that morning and pulled it out. He looked at you, but you immediately looked away. You didn’t want to know what you might feel if you met his gaze, and you couldn’t bring yourself to look back up until you heard the front door close behind him.


End file.
